Big Brother 8: Dick and Daniele on The Early Show and on the Web

It’s a good thing Dick and Daniele had bizarre sleeping habits in the Big Brother house, because the night after Dick’s big win, they both are appearing on The Early Show with Julie Chen interviewing them – at about 6:00 AM Pacific time. Let’s see if Julie has anything of interest to ask.

First we relive the show from beginning to end with a few clips, like Dick coming down into the living room to be introduced to the rest of the houseguests, a couple of their tiffs, Daniele encouraging Dick in the first phase of the final HOH competition, and finally Dick winning last night.

Now we’re back live with the Donato duo. Julie congratulates them and asks how they’re doing. Dick says they’re confused – things have been going on that they don’t know about for the last three months. Not sure if they mean out in the real world or America’s Player.

How does Dick feel about winning? Dick says the jury questions were a tip-off about the way it was likely going to go. But it was still a surprise – and the Eric thing was insane.

Julie wants to talk about their relationship because Daniele was so upset at the outset and then the relationship evolved. How did it change? Daniele says, “Honestly, we kind of had to make it change.” They weren’t going to fight and fight in the house, they had to bring themselves together. Working together like that didn’t change the past, but it did change their relationship a lot.

Was it for the sake of winning? Daniele says it was that day one, but her feelings changed drastically – back and forth through the game.

How has Dick changed? He says this is a stepping stone to getting some normalcy in their relationship. Otherwise, it hasn’t really changed him. But he gained a lot of respect for Daniele. It really changed his perspective on the woman Daniele is.

Julie has a big half-million dollar check for Dick and a $50,000 check for Daniele.

The Early Show interview ends there, but Julie keeps talking to the Donatos on the CBS website, so we’ll bring you the rest of it right here.

Julie starts back at the beginning – Daniele looked really mad to see her father. Dick didn’t look thrilled but Julie wonders if he was secretly happy because it forced Daniele to talk to him again. Dick says they showed up at the Big Brother auditions not together, but at the same time. He had a good idea that something like this might happen, and even textmessaged her when he left that she’d better be ready for this entire thing to be played out on national television. Daniele says she ignored the text. Heh.

Julie wants to know – when they were not speaking, did they text? Dick says he would send textmessages and e-mails and rarely got an answer. Julie says she got the impression that Dick was trying to force the relationship issues while Daniele just wanted to deal with the game and handle the relationship issues later. Dick agrees that this was the way it was.

Daniele says that she chose to stop talking to him. Julie asks why and Daniele says, “Did you not watch the show?!” Ha! Dick gives an “ooooh” at that one, but both are laughing. Daniele says they’ve never really had a father/daughter relationship, but more of a friendship.

After another question from Julie, Daniele says there were a lot of issues and it’s hard to explain other than to say she didn’t grow up with him and it’s not a normal relationship. Dick says he was there, she just didn’t live with him. Daniele says that even if he didn’t see the issues, they were there. She’s an emotional person, as we all know, and things probably affect her more than they should. Maybe she shouldn’t let it get to her, but she does. There was a lot of things building up to it.

Julie wonders, had it not been for Big Brother, how long would the “stand-off” have continued? Both say, “Who knows.” So are they glad, forgetting about the money? Daniele says, “Honestly, I am glad.” She never had a normal family and thought the only way she’d get one is to start her own. But everybody needs a mom and a dad. So she is glad because it’s going to start something new.

Dick says of course he’s glad. He was always glad from the first hour walking in. When he won veto and took Daniele off the block, everything he said was from the heart – he’d already won.

Did they learn something about the other person that they wouldn’t have had it not been being forced together? Dick says especially after the last five days, Daniele took the jury questions really hard. He told her that everybody wants to be where they are – who cares who wins. He didn’t care if his daughter won. The time they spent after that, Daniele was good with whatever happened.

What did Daniele learn? How to bang pots and pans! Just kidding. Did she see a good side of him that maybe she never got a chance to before? She doesn’t know if she learned anything because before they stopped talking, she feels they had a good friendship.

Dick says his situation was that he was a single dad working in clubs and bars and having two little kids and it was just weird.

Julie says it’s good to see them getting along and hopes that it leads to a lasting relationship. Dick says, “You and me both.”

Time to bring up Nick. What did Daniele say to him after the finale? Dick says the two of them were on the phone all night long. He’s moving to Orange County. Daniele tries to take control of the answer but Julie says she knows Daniele won’t tell anything. Heh. Indeed, Daniele will neither confirm nor deny that it will be a romantic relationship. Well let me tell you, people don’t up and move just to be friends.

Does Dick approve? He says he really likes Nick. The only thing with Nick when they voted him out was that he wasn’t sure Nick wasn’t playing her. He couldn’t let that happen.

Julie asks the question I wanted to hear: What about Daniele’s live-in boyfriend from before she entered the house. Daniele says she just got out of the house and hasn’t had time to talk to people about things. What a lousy excuse, given that we just found out she spent the night talking to Nick! She could have placed a call to her boyfriend. Sorry, her previous boyfriend.

She continues her excuses, saying the lease was up on their apartment anyway and he was moving back in with his parents. But she didn’t expect to meet somebody she really cared about in the house. It was just a hard situation and she’s never been involved in something like that before. She doesn’t know what’s going to happen.

Dick says that was the first time Daniele came to him for a talk. As he’s talking, she gives him quite a look that, to me, says, “Shut up! Now!” Dick notices it and says what he’s saying is true. Dick himself felt conflicted because it was something good coming out of their relationship but it was originating in something that was causing her pain. Daniele adds that she hates to hurt people.

With that, Julie congratulates them both again and we’re done! That is, Julie’s done. After this interview, I was able to talk to Dick and Daniele, and asked them some of the questions that Julie didn’t – like about Dick’s behavior. Click here to read it now!

Do you want to see the live feeds yourself – or view a replay of the action that took place in the Big Brother 8 house? Then click here:

Watch Big Brother 8 24/7 on SuperPass!

If you haven’t already, be sure to check out these other recent Big Brother 8 articles here on RealityNewsOnline:

David Bloomberg is the Editor of RealityNewsOnline and can be reached at RNO@pobox.com.

Be sure to sign up for our e-mail update so you can stay informed about new articles on the site! And take a look at the rest of the site. You can check out our Big Brother 8 page, and follow Who Wants to Be a Superhero at our WWtBaS page; and don't miss The Reality TV Hall of Shame. You can even buy reality show stuff at our Reality TV Store!

For more news about reality TV, be sure to check out SirLinksALot: Big Brother 8!